


Hearts Ablaze

by ScarletteStar1



Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: F/M, Lizzington - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-21
Updated: 2016-01-21
Packaged: 2018-05-15 08:51:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5779384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScarletteStar1/pseuds/ScarletteStar1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been a long time since Keen and Reddington parted ways.  What happens when Red sends Lizzie a secret message and beckons her to a secret meeting?  Will their love be rekindled, or will the past stay in the past?  A one shot in three parts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hearts Ablaze

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: This is a little bug that has been crawling around in my brain for months now. So here it is. I actually had this image way before I started writing fanfic, or before I even really knew what fanfic was (was there ever a time I did not know what fanfic was?!). Of course it is disclaimed as always. I do not own the Blacklist or any of its delicious characters. As always, your comments are eeevvveeerrryyyttthhhiiinnnggg. . .

**1 _._**

 

**_“Now there’s a few things we have to burn_ **   
**_Set our hearts ablaze, and every city was a gift_**   
**_And every skyline was like a kiss upon the lips_**   
**_And I was making you a wish. . . “_**   
**_\-- Florence and the Machine, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful._**

**The tickets were delivered by a courier, with a small bunch of white tulips.**

There was no card or note, but she knew who sent them.

Without a doubt.

She turned the envelope and boarding passes over and over, looking for some kind of a message, but there was none, other than the implicit expectation of her presence in Holland.

She had wondered when and how, or if ever again he would try to contact her. It had been over a year since she last saw him. There had been no contact in all that time, but when the tickets to Amsterdam came, she knew they were from him.

She just knew.

The dates on the tickets corresponded with a long-ish weekend in April, enough in advance that she could request a few days off to make the trek.

If she really wanted to go.

Not knowing what she wanted had estranged them in the first place. The thought that she better make damn sure what she wanted here and now, smacked her in the face like a cold, wet towel.

Over a year since she heard his voice, rumbling in his chest beneath her ear as they laid in bed. Over a year since she kissed his neck. Over a year since she inhaled his fragrance on her sheets and skin. Over a year. . .

She put the tulips in a vase.

They had no scent, and there was no additional greenery or other flowers in the bouquet. It was actually a rather simple arrangement, unlike their last encounter which had been messy, uncomfortable, and fraught with despair.

She had called his bluff. Told him to go. Stared him down. Turned her back.

And he left.

There was no last kiss. No final embrace.

He packed and was gone without so much as a goodbye. He probably never knew she’d run to the house where he had been staying, had burst through the door, prepared to beg him to stay, to tell him everything in hopes he, in turn, would tell her everything and they could salvage what was left of them.

She’d run to him and she’d been too late. There was nothing left of him; no crystal decanter of scotch or errant cigar ash. Not a stray sock under the bed or a scrap of a receipt on the kitchen counter. She could not even find his scent in the pillows on the bed where she knew he had slept.

He was gone.

She walked back out of the place and shut the door against the army of emotions that followed her anyway.

She had returned to her apartment and wept until her face looked deformed. She called in sick to work the next day and sat around with a bottle of pinot noir and ice packs for her swollen eyes. It made her feel pathetic, so she went back to work.

And she worked. It was all she could do.

Her eyes had been puffy for days, then a week. A month passed and she worked. The swelling subsided. Her heart rate returned mostly to normal.

At times she imagined she was being followed by his people, that maybe he was still guarding and watching over her from afar. The thought of it comforted as it enraged. She never found any concrete proof of his surveillance, and eventually she convinced herself it was all in her head. At times, she felt certain if she just sat still in the same spot for long enough, he would come to her. But he never met her at the park bench, or at the bar, or by the river.

Other times, she behaved outrageously-- changing her clothes behind a backlit sheer curtain, for example-- hoping her provocative little gestures would find their way back to him, get his attention. All to no avail.

He was gone.

She moved on, but she remained shocked and shaken by how different the world had become. It was like gravity had a different pull on her. When she saw dust motes glittering in the sun, she heard his voice wax poetic about the evening light through a certain window. The scent of a cigar on the street made her whip her head around to catch a glimpse of his fedora disappearing through a crowd.

He was everywhere, but nowhere.

It was like she had acclimated to a different atmosphere while with him, and she had to learn how to breathe on her home planet all over again. The world was tainted with him, as though she wore his face over her’s and saw things in different light, through different eyes.

Eventually she learned the world again, for what it was, tainted or no.

 _I don’t know if I can live without you_ , he’d said.

 _And I know I can’t live my life always reading between the lines of your rhetoric_ , she’d answered.

 _If this is what you want, then,_ he’d said.

And she had not replied. Not another word uttered between them.

Even now, as she stared at the tulips, there was no actual dialogue. No request or invitation. No apology. No answers. Just a very plain bunch of tulips and airline tickets in an unmarked envelope. She plucked a petal off one of the blooms and rubbed it between her thumb and index finger.

She pretended for a day to think it over.

But she asked for the time off from work. Cooper actually looked relieved she was taking some time off as he approved her benefit request form. He’d been vocal about his concerns regarding her “state” after Reddington left.

The task force had stopped tracking Reddington. In addition to exposing and dismantling the Cabal, Red had helped clear Liz’s name and reestablish her position as an esteemed agent. He also gave up the remaining names on the Blacklist. While they could not exonerate him or offer him any immunity, there was a tacit agreement that they would stop pursuing him. If they knew about his intimacy with Liz, they turned a blind eye.

When he left, some eyebrows raised, especially in Liz’s direction, but they did not go after him. Cooper had been annoyingly paternal towards Liz, and Ressler had been just plain annoying, both of them trying to persuade her to go to therapy or take a leave for a while. She’d kept them all at arm’s length, and continued with work so impeccable no one could formally complain about her.

When she asked for the days in April, she didn’t offer them any cover story, and they didn’t ask where she was going or what she was doing. Maybe they suspected, but she really didn’t care. She just said she was taking a couple days before she started losing the massive amount of vacation time she had accrued.

Even after Cooper signed off on the request, she told herself she was still thinking it over.

Even as she boarded the plane on a drizzly April evening she told herself she could still go back. She settled into her first class seat, trying to convince herself she still had a choice, that she wasn’t really going through with it. The flight attendant paused next to her seat with a tray of champagne flutes. “Miss Keen?”

“Yes. That’s me,” she said.

“This is for you,” said the flight attendant. She handed Liz a white envelope with the glass of champagne. Liz thanked her. She waited until they were wheels up, and she drained her champagne before opening the envelope. Inside there was a square of paper.

_Grand Hotel Amrath. Tower Suite._

It was written in black ink on the cardstock.

Liz recognized the writing.

It was time to stop pretending she wasn’t doing what she most definitely was doing. It was time to prepare to see him again.

She really hadn’t a clue how to accomplish this task, other than having another glass of champagne.

The alcohol turned a key, and the cruising altitude opened a door in her mind that had been snugly shut for months since she’d walked out of his empty house. She stepped up to peer in, and suddenly felt as though she was sucked into a void, free-falling, right through the bottom of the aircraft, plummeting towards the ground thousands of feet below.

For a moment, she thought she would vomit. But she drew herself up with a deep breath and commanded her stomach to stop lurching. She reminded herself of the Elizabeth Keen her colleagues called “sir” for being so strong, focused, demanding and fastidious. Over the past few months she had become much like that woman again. She was less social and more serious. The work became everything.

Reddington had softened her. He had held her in his warm hands like a stiff lump of clay, gradually warming and making her more supple in his grasp. During their time together on the run, he had molded her into a new version of herself.

 _No. That’s not accurate_ , she thought angrily, staring out the window at the darkness yawning below. He had not changed or softened her. She had bent over backwards, and she did it of her own volition. She did it because being adored by Raymond Reddington had tantalized her to the brink of addiction. With him she had been strong and sweet and firm and flexible. She had been everything she ever wanted to be under his abiding hands.

She had not changed so much as she became.

She pushed her seat back and closed her eyes, but she knew she wouldn’t sleep. She listened to the hum of the engines, the clinking of china as people ate and drank, and the tapping of fingers on a keyboard as the man across from her wrote something on his laptop. She opened her eyes and looked at him. He caught her gaze.

“Sorry,” he said. “Is it bothering you?”

“Not at all,” she replied with a smile. It felt good to talk to someone, to hear her own voice out loud as opposed to the deafening rancour in her brain.

“Going to Amsterdam?” He asked her. She nodded. “Business or pleasure?”

“I think I’m going to visit an old friend,” she said. It sounded right when she said it. She chatted with the man a few minutes longer, then he resumed his work and she resumed wondering who she was now, and who she would be when she finally stood face to face with Red.

There was no telling.

Corridors of rumination led her back to their last night together. It was always that night she played over and over, her mind smoothing the edges of it like a rock tumbled in the tide.

He had tried to distract her from her interrogation of him by kissing her. It had worked in the past, afterall. She didn’t blame him for trying, but she stood firm, even as his lips nibbled that sensitive spot above her collarbone, even as his hand took the liberty of untucking her shirt and stroking the bare skin of her waist, even as his fingertips brushed over her nipples making them taut against the lace of her bra. It took an effort, but she pushed him off of her.

_Give her to me, Red! Tell me where she is!_

_I’m not going to do that, Lizzie._

He tried to tell her it would place her in grave danger, tried to tell her it wasn’t what she really wanted. He tried to tell her he was only trying to protect her. As always.

_Then go. Just go._

_Is that what you really want, Lizzie?_

_If you’re not going to give me answers, after everything we’ve been through! I can’t do this anymore._

_You need to be patient, Lizzie. Give it some time. We will figure it out. He had reached out to her, trying again to draw her to him._

_I’m out of time and patience, Red. All out. She turned away from him and looked at the floor, her arms crossed over her chest. I’m done._

_I don’t know if I can live without you_ , he whispered at her back.

They were the words she heard every day when she woke, every night as she drifted off to sleep, and on an endless loop in her dreams. They were the words she worked late into the night trying to avoid, to forget, to drown out. They were the words that pinched her heart because she knew what she had done to him. For all the manipulation, games, lies, and deception he had brought into her life, she had done worse to him. She had broken down his walls. She had made him vulnerable.

They were also the words that echoed her own sentiment, that she had to go about learning how to live without him and it was more painful than a gunshot wound tearing through her flesh and bones.

She wondered how things would be different if she had turned around when he said those words, if she had seen a certain look on his face, if the sorrow in his eyes matched the raw husk of his voice.

There was no telling.

The rest of the flight was uneventful. She dozed at last and woke in time to see the skyline of Amsterdam come into view. It was not all that impressive, but she examined it with a tourist’s curiosity. She’d never before been to Holland. The landing was smooth, and before she knew it, she was finding her way to the baggage claim.

“Ms. Keen?”

She turned around to see a chauffeur stood with her bags already.

“Yes. That’s me,” she said.

“Right this way, Ma’am,” the man said. He led her up a series of escalators and out to a limousine. He put her bags down to open the door to the back of the car for her. Liz peered in, half expecting to see Red sitting there and waiting for her. But the car was empty. The driver put her bags in the trunk and then took his place behind the wheel. “It is about a twenty minute drive to the hotel,” he said, then put up the screen between them.

Liz helped herself to a bottle of orange juice. In her brain it was the middle of the night, but in Amsterdam it was nine in the morning. She needed some good, strong coffee to get her head in gear. She hoped she had time for a shower and change of clothes before running into Red. Time to put on her battle gear, so to speak.

The streets were crowded with people on their way to work and school. It may have looked unimpressive from the air, but at ground level, it was a pretty city. Tulip season was in peak, and there were large patches of blooming flowers in every direction she looked.

The car pulled up in front of a hugely ornate and old building on the edge of the canal. A stained-glass dome glittered in the sky. The driver lowered the partition between them. “This is your hotel, Ma’am. If you would like to check in, I will have your bags brought up.” The driver let her out and she entered the lobby of the hotel.

Liz approached the front desk. “Um, hello,” she said. “I guess I am checking into the Tower Suite?”

“Ah, yes. Good morning, Miss Keen. Here is your key. You can reach the suite through the elevator on your right over there. We trust everything will be to your satisfaction, and you will enjoy your stay here with us. Please let us know if we can assist in any way.”

“Actually,” she said, lowering her voice. “Has anyone else arrived, or checked in?”

“To the Tower Suite? No Miss Keen. Just you.” The concierge smiled at her. “We will have your bags brought up.”

“Thank you,” Liz said, shouldered her hand bag and headed to the elevator.

True to it’s name, and true to Red’s taste for the ostentatious, the Tower Suite was located in an actual tower. It was a three story situation with a fireplace, dining room, and lounge area on the first floor, an enormous master bedroom on the second floor, and a bathroom on the third floor. The jacuzzi tub boasted a 360 degree view of the city below. Liz wandered between the floors feeling jet lagged and overwhelmed.

A knock at the door caught her attention, and knocked the breath out of her lungs. She walked to the door, but it was just her bags being brought to her. She tipped the bellhop and found herself alone in the veritable palace of a suite. It probably cost more than two weeks of her salary to stay in this place for a night.

She found a little coffee pot in the dining area on the first floor, and prepared herself a cup of coffee, then she took it up to the bathroom to enjoy in the tub.

She drew a bath in the massive tub and undressed. The walls were a bright red tile, with accent walls of deep blue. It was a rich color combination. It reminded her of Red’s ties. She sank back into the water and drank her coffee. The fog of travel and fatigue left her and she rose from the tub totally refreshed.

She slipped into a robe and headed back down to make herself another cup of coffee. But as she came to the bottom of the staircase, she nearly lost her footing.

He was there.

**…………………………………………………………………………………………………………...**

**2.**

**_“What are we gonna do?_ **   
**_We’ve opened the door, now it’s all coming through_**   
**_Tell me you see it too_**   
**_We’ve opened our eyes and it’s changing the view.”_**   
**_\-- Florence and the Machine, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful._**

He was there.

Sitting, hat in hand, on the brocade cushion of the chair before the fireplace, which had burst into flames while she was in the tub.

She did not fall, but she lost her grasp on the coffee cup which bounced off the burgundy carpet and came to rest at his feet.

“Hello, Lizzie,” he said, his voice low and gruff, but he offered her a small smile. “It’s good to see you.” He bent over and picked up the cup, set it on the table next to him.

She covered her mouth with one hand, in a gesture that was completely reflexive. Her other hand, flew up to clutch at her robe, over her heart.

He stood, very slowly, as if not wanting to scare her away, but stayed in front of the chair, did not move any closer to her.

“Do you like the room? For some reason, I thought you might like to stay in a tower. If nothing else, it is unique, and quite elegant in its own way. I’d thought to stay at the Waldorf, but there are just so many flourishes at that place. It gets exhausting on the eyes after a while, although they do have a sumptuous dessert cart. Would you have rather stayed at the Waldorf, Lizzie? We could still change, if you prefer.”

Liz stood in frozen silence.

“Well, Lizzie? Say something.”

“I--” she gasped. “I don’t know what to say.” She had been right. There was no way she could have prepared herself for this moment.

“I’ve startled you,” he said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Well, considering your track record with invading my personal space, I should have seen this coming,” she said. She didn’t mean it to sound quite as severe as it came out. He winced before bobbing his head in acquiescence.

“Technically our personal space,” he said. “I booked the room for both of us. But I can stay on a separate floor if you would rather.”

“It’s fine,” she managed. “The room is huge. I’m sure we can figure it out. Will Dembe be staying with us as well?”

“No. I’ve given him a couple days off. I believe he is surfing in Maui. Or taking a yoga intensive in Sedona. I don’t know really. But I do like to imagine him surfing.”

“So, you’re here alone?”

“Not alone, Lizzie. I’m here with you,” he said. He put his hat down on the table, next to the coffee cup, then stood before her. The space between them filled with awkward tension. He stuffed his hands into his pockets, rocked on his heels a bit and smiled. She was still frozen on the bottom step. “How are you?”

“I’m fine,” she lied and tried on a smile that felt (and probably looked) forced and false.

“Well, would you like to go and see the Van Gogh's or the Anne Frank house first? I’ve heard the canal cruises are wonderful to experience in the evenings, and there is a notable bistro not far from here. We can also go to the apartment where that girl with the pearl earring was painted, or so I hear. I don’t imagine the Hash and Marijuana Museum would be up your alley, but wouldn’t it be a quirky little bit of trivia to be able to say you went to such a place? I can just see Donald’s face when you utter that in a casual conversation-- what a gas! Other than that, I’m just about dying for a stroopwafel. Have you ever had one? Oh, there is nothing quite like it.”

“Stroopwafel?” She said in a measured voice, trying not to sound too incredulous. “Did you bring me here to sight-see and snack with you?” She whispered. For some reason she could not make her words come out any louder, and try though she did, she could not un-furrow her brow.

“If you like.”

“What am I doing here, Red?” She asked the question and expected a witty and expansive retort in classic Reddington style, so she found herself surprised when he bowed his head and shrugged his shoulders. It was fine. She wasn’t really sure she could handle more of an answer than that at the moment. “I’ll go get dressed,” she finally offered.

She climbed back up the stairs to the middle floor and considered her luggage, which was neatly laid out before her. She unzipped her bag and plucked out a fresh outfit. She dressed quickly, brushed out her hair which was almost dry from the bath, and applied a discrete amount of makeup. She didn’t want to seem desperate or eager or like she was trying to make a statement with her appearance. Playing it cool seemed like a good choice, although he would almost certainly guess that was exactly what she was doing.

When she came back down the stairs, the sight of him waiting for her gripped her heart in a manner that made her fear she would lose consciousness for a moment. He noticed and took a step towards her as though to put a hand under her elbow to stabilize her.

“Are you ok, Lizzie?” He asked in a tentative voice, uncharacteristically vulnerable and concerned.

“I’m fine,” she mumbled, waving his hand away. It struck her then that they had not yet touched one another. In fact, she had barely made eye contact with him. She looked into his eyes now. They were both familiar and foreign to her. He looked tired, maybe even a little pale. As though she were a puppet, pulled by cosmic strings, her hand floated up to his cheek and rested there. Her finger ran lightly over his skin. “It feels like I’m touching a ghost.”

“I’m no ghost,” he said, leaning into her hand and then clasping it against him with his own. “Lizzie. Can I? Can I touch you?”

“Yeah,” she whispered. And just like that, her cheek was on his chest and their arms came around one another, first tentative, then stronger and tighter. They clung together in a wordless desperation that felt either like floating or drowning, falling or flying. Liz couldn’t be sure. All she knew was Red was in her arms. After all this time.

A part of her, that she had been soundly ignoring for over a year, admitted fear that he had been dead. Killed. Abducted. Tortured. The relief of his tangible presence in her arms was unbearable.

“Oh, you feel wonderful,” he sighed. “It’s been so long.”

“Where have you been?”

“Here. There. Doesn’t really matter. I’m here now.”

“I thought,” she began. “I mean, I feared you had. . . I didn’t know if. . .” She couldn’t say the words that her brain had not even acknowledged over the past year.

“Hush,” he whispered and kissed her forehead. Classic Reddington. She inhaled his scent. Sandalwood. Vanilla. And something deeply primal. It was like a smell from a past life.

She tipped her face up to him. “You know, you never kissed me goodbye.” The words came out of her lips in a strangled lament, as tears spilled down her cheeks, and she hated herself for betraying such weakness, for the rip in her voice.

“Well then. I guess I owe you a kiss,” he said. “Would you like to collect it now?”

She nodded.

He kissed her cheek.

“That’s all?” She asked. She pulled away to arm’s length and looked at him. He was smiling, holding back a peal of laughter, testing her. She couldn’t help but smile back, and for a moment, the months and distance, anger and uncertainty melted away. There was instant recognition each had of the other. It was pleasant. All the nagging questions she had took a back seat so she could simply be in the moment with him.

He nuzzled her nose with his, then released her from the embrace.

“Shall we?” He motioned toward the door. Liz picked up her jacket, and he took it from her and held it so she could put her arms into it. As he adjusted it over her shoulders, he brushed her hair to the side creating a clear path for his lips to her neck. “This neck,” he growled and sighed. “This neck has haunted my dreams.” He kissed her there again. Her eyes rolled back as they closed, and she leaned back against him. “Come on,” he whispered. “Let’s go see Amsterdam.”

They ate lunch on an outdoor patio at a nearby restaurant with a view of a windmill. There were dramatic patches of bright tulips everywhere they looked. Red insisted that the veal kroket was going to change both of their lives and ordered it for both of them along with a bottle of wine which Liz suspected cost about as much as her rent for the month. They also picked from a lavish cheese and fruit cart.

“So, Lizzie, how have you been? You look well,” he asked, contemplating a slice of starfruit and hunk of gouda.

“I’ve been fine,” she said. There was no way to describe the tears and loneliness and searching she had done over the past year. “And you? You’re looking tired. Are you okay?”

“I am well. As you know, I don’t sleep much.”

“I do seem to remember that,” she said. She recalled how when they were on the run there were times they stayed up all night. Sometimes they tossed and turned and pretended to sleep. Some nights they talked until the sunrise. And on other nights they turned to one another, finally falling asleep after taking and giving pleasure like it was a sweet elixir for all their trauma and exhaustion.

He reached for her hand across the table.

“Are you seeing anyone? Dating?” He asked in a voice so hoarse she barely understood him.

“No,” she answered. “But I suspect you already knew the answer to that question.”

“Honestly, I didn’t. I’ve not had you followed, if that is what you are suggesting.”

“You haven’t?” She didn’t know if she should feel hurt or relieved. She thought of all the hours she spent on the park bench, waiting for him to show up.

“No. When I left, I left. Not that I wasn’t tempted to keep some eyes on you. Old habits die hard and all that. But it seemed somehow disingenuous to have you surveilled. After everything.”

“After everything,” she repeated. She cleared her throat and looked up from under her lashes. “And you? You must have lovely ladies in every port of call?”

“There’s no one, Lizzie. Since you, there has been only you.”

“Is that right?”

“Afraid so,” he said and shrugged. “Shall we order another bottle of wine, or shall we go for a walk? There is a bakery around here that is rumored to have the most amazing stroopwafel.”

“So, is that it? We are just going to eat our way across Amsterdam?”

“Well, there are also the canals and museums. And if you didn’t notice it is tulip season. I’d assumed you would not want to partake of the red light district, although I’m game if you are. There was this one cafe that had a blue hashish. Blue! It was literally the color of cotton candy. I swear after three hours--”

“Red. No stories. I don’t think I can take one of your stories right now.”

“Fair enough,” he conceded. “Then what would you like to do now?”

“I don’t know. This whole vacation and tourist thing is completely new to me. The last time I was travelling I was a fugitive on the run, remember?”

He squeezed her fingers. “I remember.”

“So, you’ll have to forgive me for not quite knowing how to do this relaxing thing,” she sighed and returned the pressure on his fingers.

“What else would you like to see in Amsterdam, Sweetheart?”

“I don’t care about seeing anything in Amsterdam besides you, Red.”

“Then let’s sit with another bottle of wine and let the afternoon simmer,” he purred, indeed looking as content as a cat as he smiled at her.

After a bottle of sweet wine, they wandered the city, arm in arm, into the late afternoon. They walked through parks and admired tulips, then braved the crowds at the outdoor market. Red seemed enthralled with every chocolate shop they passed, and sampled a truffle or bon bon at just about every one.

“You’ll make yourself sick,” Liz laughed at him.

“Impossible!” He said in a merry and sticky voice. “I have a fantastic sweet tooth, if you haven’t forgotten.” They had taken a turn down an alley between an ancient-looking cathedral and a wrought iron fence.

“One of your more nefarious qualities, if I remember correctly,” Liz teased with a sigh. Red pushed her up against the church wall with his body then. One hand came up to press against the stone of the building over her shoulder, and the other hand brought a truffle up to her lips.

“Taste for yourself,” he demanded. Their stare was unbroken as her lips parted to accept the sweet. It was decadent, as was the feeling of his body pressed against her.

“Delicious,” she said, threading her arms around his waist, pulling him even closer, feeling grounded and ecstatic all at once.

“It is, isn’t it?” He buzzed. “But to be honest, I’ve had a taste in my mouth for something else. All this time. The sweets have been a lackluster substitute.” He lowered his face to hers and said against her lips, “I think you still owe me that kiss.”

“Um, I believe it was you who owed me a kiss,” she murmured.

“Either way,” he said and pressed his lips to hers. He opened her mouth with his tongue and it swept into her like a melting caramel and she looped her arms around his neck and she crushed him against her and both of their mouths tasted of chocolate and it grew warm between their bodies but the stone of the cathedral was cool behind her back and she never wanted the kiss to end and she could tell he never wanted the kiss to end, but just as it was about to deepen, the voices of a group of young tourists came chattering down the alley.

Red and Lizzie parted and continued walking down the alley. It was a good thing his arms held fast around her as they walked, because her legs were quivering along with the rest of her body.

The day sank down and died against the tulip beds as night was born around them.

 

**…………………………………………………………………………………………………………**

**3.**

**_“So much time on the other side_ **   
**_waiting for you to wake up_**   
**_Maybe I’ll see you in another life_**   
**_if this one wasn’t enough_**   
**_So much time on the other side. . . .”_**   
**_\-- Florence and the Machine, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful_**

“Are you dying?”

He laughed heartily at that question. “Well, Lizzie, as Jim Morrison said ‘No one here gets out alive,’ and I suppose in a sense we are all dying all the time. ‘In the midst of life we are in death, etc.’ But no. I do not plan on dying anytime soon. At least not today. Why on earth would you ask me that?”

“Because we’re here. And it has been a long time. And I had no idea if I would ever see you again.”

“Well,” he murmured, kissing her neck and stroking the length of her body. “I am planning on dying a dozen or so petite mort, or ‘little deaths’ with you over the next couple days.”

They laid in the large bed of the Tower Suite.

After walking through the city, they had eaten dinner and went for a canal cruise as stars freckled the sky. Red had kept his arms around her almost the entire time, even sitting next to instead of across from at dinner. It was a tender and sweet courtship, the likes of which they had not known during their run, or even after it when they were home and things unravelled.

The proximity of his body tethered her to earth again. She wouldn’t float away. She wouldn’t fall. As long as he was near.

Red bought a sack of stroopwafel and they made their way back to the hotel.

There were times when they were just quiet, holding hands or looking at one another. As sweet as it was, Liz knew questions lurked under the surface of their glowing bubble, and that glowing bubble was going to pop as soon as they were uttered.

So, she put it off.

She put it off as they kissed by the church. She put it off as they sipped wine. She put it off as they bit and rubbed against each other on the elevator ride up to their suite, as they fumbled up the stairs pulling off each other’s clothing, and as they took one another in with adoration and familiarity.

She said nothing as she laid, stretched on top of his body, her face nuzzled into his chest, her fingers plucking lightly at his nipples and hair as he moaned beneath her. No words broke the silence as they entered one another, carried only on the whisper of their breath. And nothing was said as they rode out their pleasure with one another, arms wound tightly around the other, lips busy with kissing and not with talking.

After, they tucked their bodies into one another, breathing and smiling because if they were not smiling, they would be weeping. Lizzie’s palm gently floated over Red’s scars.

_I don’t know if I can live without you._

The words were on the tips of both of their tongues, but they said nothing and kissed instead.

When they parted from the kiss, Lizzie knew the time had come. She had to ask. Every moment that had passed without words had been like a petal plucked from a tulip. Now she laid there next to him with an invisible stem, wilting and bare in her mind.

“Did you find my mother?”

He didn’t answer. In fact, he kept perfectly still. He didn’t tighten his embrace, or kiss her hair, or even take a deeper breath. He was perfectly still.

It was Liz who broke away and sat up on an elbow, looked at him, her eyes ablaze with tears.

“Tell me, Red. You have to tell me,” she whispered.

“So we are back to this.” He said. It was not a question, so much as a statement, and he remained still as he said it.

“You had to know I would ask,” she said. She watched him close his eyes, and as he did so, he pushed her out of the bed of ferns where she had been resting in the calm and green of his gaze, and she found she was outside herself again, drifting, scared.

“Red, I have a right to know. Please. You had to know when I came here I would ask about her.”

“Yeah,” he growled. She touched the golden fringe of his lashes as they rested on his cheek, his eyes still shut. She felt meek as she did it, but desperation was starting to build in her chest, her heart throbbing to the point of explosion. She willed him to open his eyes, to let her back in because it was dark and cold on this other side of him.

“Please,” she said again. He opened his eyes and found her, but she didn’t feel found. Her heart felt like it was on fire it was beating so fast, but the rest of her body felt cold, almost numb. “I need to know.”

“Elizabeth,” he began and she hated the almost paternal sound of his voice in that moment. The heat of her heart pumped fury, hot and vivid, back towards her extremities. “You are going to be upset with what I have to say now. But it is the only thing I can say: You must let this go.”

“I can’t!”

“You must.” He caressed her face in what was meant to be a loving gesture, but she wiggled out of his grasp and got up from the bed. She wrapped herself in a robe and stood before him. He was stretched out on his back, one arm behind his head, the other resting on his bare stomach. His eyes followed her as she paced back and forth in front of him. “Lizzie,” he finally sighed. “Come back to bed.”

“No,” she said firmly in a voice that was louder than she really intended. “I don’t understand what is happening here. Why? Why won’t you just tell me? I’ve come all this way! I know you know, Red. I can see it all over your face and I need to know. I’ve lost almost everything over the past couple years. Please give me this. Please.”

“I’m sorry for what you have lost, Lizzie. I know it was all mostly my doing, but there were so many balls set in motion before you were even born. I’ve always known what you were born into, and it is one of the reasons I encouraged you to think so soberly about the adoption thing back then. Now, as much as it pains both of us, the best I can do is try to keep you safe, preserve whatever you have left. I know you want to know who and why you are. I know you think that information regarding Katerina will help you with that, will bring you some sort of peace and clarity, but you need to trust me when I tell you it will not be helpful and could even be harmful. After everything I have done, the lengths to which I have gone to protect you, you have to understand why I am asking you now, begging you to let this go.”

“I don’t understand it!”

“Then,” he said and sat up. “You will have to simply accept it.” He swung his legs over the side of the bed, stood, and picked his robe off of a chair. “I’m going up to take a bath. If you would like to join me, you are more than welcome.” He walked past her to the stairs. The conversation was over.

Lizzie flopped on the bed, thrashed for a while between rage and terror.

It was an argument almost identical to the one over a year ago, the scene that ended with Red walking out of the door and out of her life. She heard the water run in the bathroom over her head, then the hum of the jacuzzi jets, and she pictured him sinking into the tub, his face a mask of sorrow and regret.

She could have gone to him.

She could have changed the narrative here and now and gone to him, climbed into the water and let him hold her, warm her. But she couldn’t make herself move in that direction. She turned off the lights in the room and stared into the darkness and shook, hypothermic with raw emotion.

Eventually she fell asleep. When she woke, she patted the space next to her. His body was not there. She sat up in a panick. He had left.

He had left her again.

She flipped on the light and looked around with a sigh of relief. A tie snaked over the arm of the chair, and his coat was hanging in the closet, his shoes standing resolutely beneath it. She commanded her heart to slow down as she got out of bed.

She crept down the stairs to the living room. He sat in the chair before the fireplace, drinking scotch, mesmerized by the flames. He wore a white bathrobe, a triangle of his chest peeking from its folds. He looked up only briefly when she came down the stairs.

“In almost every culture, there is a story of fire being stolen from the deities and given to humankind. According to the Greeks, Prometheus stole fire and gave it to man to enable to progress of society. In Native American folklore, possum failed to steal the fire, so spider was sent on a mission to bring it back. She snuck into the land of light and hid the fire in a clay pot. The ability to bend fire to our will is what separates us from the animals. And it is a magical paradox because it can be used not only to create, but also to destroy. Of course you and I would know this perhaps more than most, wouldn’t we, Lizzie?”

“What am I doing here, Red?” She sighed, uncertain if she was happy to see him, or if she was still infuriated by their earlier conversation.

“Well, it’s two in the morning. I think you know what you’re doing here. Or maybe you would just like a drink? Can I pour you a scotch?”

“Cut the crap,” she snapped. “For once could you please just be honest with me? Why did you bring me here?”

“I’ve almost always been honest with you, Lizzie,” he murmured.

“Yeah, well ‘almost’ doesn’t count for much.”

“Perhaps, then, it should count for more,” he said. His voice was tired and sad. He sipped his scotch. “I did not bring you here, per se. I invited you. An invitation which you accepted.”

“Then why did you ‘invite’ me here? Is this your idea of a clean slate? A new country? I don’t mean to go into cliche psychological conclusions here, but changing our environment isn’t going to fix anything. There is no erasing what we’ve been through, you and I.”

He stood and crossed the floor to where she stood at the bottom of the stairs. He took her hand and led her to the chair across from where he had been sitting. He gestured toward it and she sat. He sat back down and poured her a drink. She allowed his hand to graze her’s as he handed her the drink.

“I’m not trying to fix anything, Lizzie. I couldn’t fix any of the despair I’ve wrought even if I tried. And I would lay down my life before I would erase even one moment with you. No. I invited you here because I missed you,” he said.

“You missed me?” She said it and was surprised at how incredulous and angry it sounded.

“Yes. I missed you. Yearned to see that sour, little face and grumpy eyebrow. Ah, there it is now!” He chortled before shaking his head and looking terribly sad. “As it turns out, I was quite sick with longing, since we are being honest and all. And I’ve gained about ten pounds from eating sweets, you may have noticed. As I said, they are a poor substitute for what I really crave.”

“Me?”

“You, Lizzie.”

“You left,” she whispered.

“No, Elizabeth. You turned me out. As long as we are being honest with one another here, let’s call that what it really was.”

“But you left me,” she said again. She looked at him through a veil of tears that blurred and softened him, made him appear as a wavering mirage before her. She reached out to touch his arm to test reality.

He was there. His arm was solid beneath her hand and a layer of French, terry robe. She sipped her scotch.

“Do you know I started drinking scotch after you left?”

“Did you?”

“Yes,” she said and took another sip. “I started drinking scotch because it reminded me of you. Red, when you left I was lost. I cried for days. There was a bench, by the Potomac. I used to go and sit there endlessly because I thought if I sat there long enough you would show up. I wanted you to come back to me and I didn’t know how to find you, or if you even wanted to be found. I know it’s pathetic.” She shook her head and took another sip of scotch. As she looked back up, a tear slid down her cheek. Red took her hand and pulled her toward him.

“Come here, Lizzie,” he said. He set down his glass and put both his hands out to reach for her. She took his hands and they stood. He held her and kissed her and his breath tasted of scotch and stroopwafel.

She realized then that her real need was not knowing the whereabouts of her mother, but being with him. While she was thinking this, Red untied both of their robes and the hair on his body teased her sleek flesh. “Can we please go to bed?” He asked. She nodded and they walked back up the stairs, together.

The next couple of days passed and they spent them mostly in bed or in the jacuzzi, limbs entwined around limbs. As luck would have it, the hotel had five star room service, and they learned that neither of them were particularly as interested in VanGogh as they were in reconnecting with one another. Nothing enchanted in Amsterdam nearly as much as what transpired in their little tower.

Questions were left unanswered, and Liz tried to be accepting, if not content, as she packed her bags.

“Going back to the Post Office is going to seem like another life after this,” she said.

They stood in front of the window, looking out at the city.

“Well, Sweetheart, we’ll always have Amsterdam,” Red said.

“Are you coming back?”

“To Amsterdam?”

“No. Back with me. To the States.”

“No.” His answer was clipped, decisive. Liz felt she was shoved out a plane at cruising altitude with no parachute. Her stomach lurched as she turned to him.

“But Red, what was this then? What was this for?”

“I needed to see you,” he stepped closer and put his arms around her.

“You have to come back with me,” she said, her voice breaking with emotion.

“Walking away from you was by far the most difficult thing I have ever done, Lizzie. But I can’t come back. When I left, I left. As much as I missed you, yearned for you, was ill thinking about you, I realized we can’t play house. It isn’t for us. If we were together all day, every day, we would destroy each other. We would devour the goodness of what we have and it would be more miserable than we could bear. We have here and now.”

“But what happens now?”

“Lizzie, you are the embodiment of every sweet memory, of anything that was ever good or pure in my life.” His lips sigh against her skin.

“Won’t you come back with me?”

“No.”

“What are we going to do? How are we supposed to pack this all away and close the door again?”

“We’ll leave the door open, Sweetheart. I’ll send more tickets.”

“Red, I --” She was about to say she didn’t think she could figure out how to live without him. She was about to start crying and she knew the tears would never stop.

“Shhh,” he whispered against her lips. “Where else would you like to go? What else would you like to see? The pyramids? The Northern Lights? Paris? The Himalaya, maybe? Venice is lovely; we could make love on a gondola. What other city can we fill with ecstasy, Lizzie?”

“It’s not enough,” she said. She grabbed the lapels of his coat and pulled him against her. She kissed him fiercely. “Red, it’s not enough.”

“Elizabeth. Sweetheart. It’s everything. You’ll see. That’s always been your biggest fear, hasn’t it? Losing me?” He held her at arm’s length, looking at her sternly.

“Yes.”

“Lizzie, you will never lose me. Ever. Trust me. You can trust me on this.” He buried his face in her hair and stroked up and down her back. “You have to trust me.”

“It hurts, though. Losing you hurts so much, Red. I can’t keep doing it.”

“You’re not losing me. We’re both just going away for a bit on business. You’ll see.”

“Do you think we can ever figure out how to do this and not cause each other pain?”

“Look out the window, Lizzie,” he said in a voice that was low, commanding. She turned to look out the window at the skyline of Amsterdam which blurred before her as her eyes teared. It really wasn’t much of a skyline, but she wanted to remember every detail of it, every tulip, every rooftop of every canal house. Her shoulders rose and fell in a shuddering sob.

Red pulled her body back against his. Her breathing slowed to mimic his. He put his arms around her, bit her neck, and breathed against her skin. His hand stroked down over her chest and came to the button of her jeans. He deftly undid the button and slid his hand into her pants. His finger traced the edge of her underwear before nudging it aside.

“How does this feel?” He whispered. “Does this hurt?” He bit her earlobe as he pressed his fingers into her. Her legs buckled, but he held her fast against him. She bit her bottom lip. His fingers glided over her as though figure skating. His other hand went up her shirt and scooped a breast into his palm. He nibbled her neck as he played her. “Is this painful, Sweetheart?”

“No,” she whispered, turning her head back to find his lips with her own.

“You’re mine, Elizabeth. Do you remember?” He moaned, returning her kiss. “Remember?”

“Yes, I remember. . . yes, Raymond. Oh, yes.”

He was undressing her and dragging her back over to the bed and if either were worried about catching their ride to the airport, neither voice such concern.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Liz made it home. She slept for most of the flight, thanks to Red’s parting gift of pleasure, and returned to her apartment before midnight.

She was unpacking when there was a knock at her door. She opened it to find a potted orchid, a bottle of sake, and an unmarked envelope.

**Fin.**


End file.
